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let me.~ Episodic empiricism is illustrated by information gathering that is unhound by prior constraints..
ge~
. Brutfer et at! (N~ Yortc:: J. Bryte! rsistence seems to be one of those gifts from the gods tltat make people mo xaggeratedly what they are. Needless to say. how to summarize things to himself. He gives groups of subjects information of a con. a characeeristic. say a word more about the ways in which information may get transformed when the problem solver has activ~ly processed it. and that is deficient in organizational persistency'I'he opposite extreme is illustrated by an approach that is characterized ~onn5st~int sensitivity. . and jhe like. each cycle of questio~ usually being given over to the pursuit of some particular notion.. Of Thinking by J.. Organized persistence is a maneuver for protecting our fragile cognitive apparatus from overload.. Both 'Within cycles and between cycles one can discern a marked difference on the connectivity of the child's performance. -. he 'finds
. -what has come to be called n-ach..
"
. In gener~!. are "pot-shotters. 'brings to .episodic empiricism: conservative focussing is an example of cumulative constructionism: . children who employ constraint location as' a technique preliminary to the formulation of hypotheses tend to be fur more connected in their harvesting of information. 19t6). that lacks connectivity.he ere ir's
office for an appointment and the car got out of control?" There are children who' precede hypotheses with efforts to ledte'tonjtraint and there are those who. Wiley . others that it is merely to be kep~n mind..
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>e. to us~ our local slang. .~hai ~.. and a ~ersi~t ence that stems from the sequential organization that 'a·chit. SuccesSive scatlging illustrates well what is.
• I'should also remark in passing that the two 'extremes also-characterize concept attainment strategies liS reported in If Stud. The child who has flooded himself with disorganized informatio~from un~onnec~ed hypotheses will become discouraged and confused sooner than the child who Bas shown !Ia certain cunning in his strategy of getting inforrriasion-c-a' cunning whose principal component is the recognition that the value of iI!fprmatiQn is not simply in getting it but in being able to carry it. .
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. ~ " ~ trolled kind.compounded o(.:. some groups being told that th~ir task is to transmit the information to others.. 1957).y . There is first of all a pragmatic questipn: what does it take to information processed into a form' best designed to fit some future use? Take 'an experiment by Zajonc8 as a case in point.
ty ar d e t
s:
~ he en in .' appear to be two components: a sheer doggedness'c~ihpon~i. S.
• R: B. Zajonc (PersOnal communication. Persistence is another feature of strategy. Doggedness is probably just animal spirits or the n~ed Ior' achievement . task. and by organized persistente.. A second element of strategy !s its connectivity of information gathering: the extent to which questions asked . The persistence of the organized child stems from his knowledge of how to organize questions in cycles.maneuvers.the '.": who string out hypotheses non-cumulatively one after the other.
..! Before returning to the issue of discovery and its role in the development of thinking.utilize or ignore or violate information previously obtained: The questions asked by chil9t'en tend to be organized in cycles.. by connective ..
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. meant here Jl.

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. all of which promote an effective-a competent-interaction with the environment. There has recently appeared a most searching and ~ important criticism of this position.'"
. and skill. •
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. there is competence motivation as well as competence in its more familiar sense of achieved capacity: The-behavior that leads to the building up of effective grasping. to take one example. the competence motive. crawling and walking.'. manipulating and changing the surroundings. efficiency. 297-SSS. competence means fitness or ability. SI7-18. attention and perception."
I am suggesting ~hat there ~e forms of activity that serve to enlist and develop. It is therefore a suitable word to describe such things as grasping and exploring. that maturation plays a part in all these developments. language and thinking.s
-. It is directed. The doctrine is greatly extended by the idea of secondary reinforcement: any state associated even . . that serve to make it the driving force behind behavior. under the general heading of competence. Let me summarize some of his principal conclusions ana explore their applicability to the hypothesis stated above. but this part is heavily overshadowed by learning in all the more complex accomplishments like speech or skilled manipulation.
lore
ield For
ent. LXVI (19&9). «tu«.
of
the classic view of motivation in learning has been. which indeed it cat1.remotely with the reduction of a primary _drive could also have the effect of producing learning. proficiency. that the drive-reduction model of learning runs counter to too many important phenomena of learning and development to be etther regarded as general in its applicability or even c&rrect in its -general approach. and letting go of. and of research on the development of cognitive ~esses in children.OSC
hey t i6 leir Ie is han 1 to
l~ow propose that we gather the various kinds of behavior just mentioned. .not serve until it is almost perfected. objects. reviewing the evidence of recently published animal studies.
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\g. selective. "Motivation Reconaidered: The Concept of Competence. all of which have to do with effective interaction with the environment. written by Professor Robert White. 1should like to add to White's general premise that the exercise of competence motives has the effect of strengthening the degree to which they gain control . until ~ery recently.'White.. is not random behavior that is produced by an overflow of energy. and persistent. Professor White comes to the conclusion. and it continues not because it serves primary drives. Jt is true of-course. I shall argue that it is necessary to make-competence a motivational concept. According to \\lebster.
a R.
. handling." Review.
psychblogical
. couched in terms of a theory of drives and reinforcement: that Jearning occurred by virtue of the fact that a response produced by a stimulus was followed by the reduction in a primary drive state. but because it satisfies an intrinsic need to deal with the environment.. and the suggested synonyms include capability.Ie
y. capacity.. pp. of work in the field of ps)'choanalysis. quite rightly thlllk.